After a cryptic phone call, a woman disappears on a cross-country trip, leaving her family with more questions than answers. Where is Nancy Bromet?
Episode Media
Episode Sources
- Nancy Claira Bromet – The Charley Project
- El Centro Police Seek Help Locating Missing Woman
- Nancy Bromet Not Heard From Since Calling Sister in Distress
- ‘I’m going to believe that she’s somewhere alive,’ sister says of missing Sunrise woman
- Sister keeps faith that Sunrise woman missing 44 days is alive
- Nancy Bromet – Dateline: Missing in America
- Nancy Bromet – Uncovered
Episode Transcript
Welcome back to Bite-Sized Crime. This week I’m bringing you the case of a woman who vanished under mysterious circumstances. Her case hasn’t received much attention, but her family still deserves answers. This episode discusses sensitive topics, so listener discretion is advised.
Nancy Claira Bromet was born on Long Island, New York, in May of 1978. When Nancy and her siblings were young, the Bromet family moved to the Sunrise area of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, where Nancy eventually attended Plantation High School. Her family and friends described her as kind and loving, someone who was fun to be around.
Growing up on the Atlantic Coast should have been idyllic. But Nancy’s life in Florida hadn’t been easy. She struggled with addiction and substance abuse, and court filings in Broward County show that in her early twenties, she had been arrested on charges of aggravated battery and possession of cannabis. Her relationships were often up and down, and she had dealt with situations of domestic violence. In 1998, she filed for a protective order against a male partner.
But through all of the uncertainty and turmoil, Nancy had her family by her side. Her sister Laura told Dateline that even when Nancy was in the depths of addiction, she always kept in contact with them, never going more than a few days without a call or text. The Bromet family was close and supportive.
In early 2015, Nancy was in a really good place. She was living in Sunrise with her father Jerry, staying clean and receiving disability benefits. She had her family around her, and she was happy.
But then, a new drug hit the scene. Known as “flakka”, the synthetic stimulant was cheap and easy to get, and before long, it had caused multiple fatalities in the Fort Lauderdale area. Unfortunately, Nancy got pulled back into her addiction and began another downward spiral. Her family did everything they could to support her and keep her safe.
Not long after, in the fall of 2015, Nancy reconnected with an old flame – Julio Jesus Cruz. Nancy and Cruz had dated for a few years around 2007, but their relationship was tumultuous, and by 2010, Cruz was out of the picture. Now, Cruz was back and Nancy was ecstatic, but not everyone held a high opinion of Julio Cruz. He was quite a bit older than Nancy, 50 years old to her 37, and he had been in and out of jail over the years, including time spent on charges of aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. Nancy’s friends and family were concerned about his re-entry into her life.
Now that Cruz was back, things started moving very quickly. On August 15th, Nancy changed her status on Facebook to “in a relationship”. Then, just three weeks later, Nancy shocked everyone by posting that she was moving to California.
Several friends expressed their surprise and concern, commenting that they hoped Nancy wasn’t rushing into anything and that they wanted her to be careful. In response, Nancy commented, “I am in luv!… He is a good man! We dated for two and a half years 6 years ago! God is good and I am going to leave… Everything is in his hands.”
On November 12, 2015, Nancy packed up her belongings and left her home in Sunrise. Cruz worked as a long-haul trucker, and the couple were planning to drive his orange 18-wheeler across the country to Bakersfield, California, making delivery stops along the way. Nancy said her goodbyes to her father and siblings and hit the road.
Over the next few days, Nancy checked in with her family often. For some reason, Nancy hadn’t taken her own cell phone with her on the trip; she made all her calls and texts through Cruz’s phone.
On November 17th, just five days into the trip, Jerry Bromet got a call from Cruz’s number. On the other end of the phone, he could hear the trouble in his daughter’s voice. According to Jerry, Nancy told him that she was “distressed” and wanted to come home. Jerry told her to have Cruz take her to the airport – he would buy her a plane ticket home no questions asked.
And it wouldn’t be the first time. According to the Sun Sentinel, Nancy had found herself in a similar situation years earlier, when she and Cruz had first been together. During a rough patch in their relationship, Nancy had been stranded in Las Vegas, desperate to get home. Her father had bought her a plane ticket and got her back to Florida safely.
But this time was different. After Jerry made the offer, he heard Nancy ask Cruz, “Well, what do you think?” Then, there was silence.
Assuming they had simply gotten disconnected, Jerry waited for Nancy to call him back. But time passed, and Nancy didn’t call. Finally, Jerry dialed Cruz’s number himself, but instead of Nancy’s voice, it was Cruz on the other end. He told Jerry that Nancy couldn’t talk because she was sleeping.
Jerry didn’t push the issue, figuring he would just talk to Nancy later, but he felt that something was off about the whole situation. This suspicion was confirmed when days later, Nancy still hadn’t reached out. This was not normal behavior for her, and her family was growing increasingly concerned.
Nancy’s sister Laura called Cruz over and over again, but he kept brushing her off. It was only after she started calling the trucking company that employed him that Cruz finally told her that Nancy was missing.
According to Cruz, they had reached California on November 19th, two days after Nancy had called her father in distress. On November 20th, around 9:45am, Cruz dropped Nancy off at a shopping center in El Centro, a small city just a few miles from the Mexican border. He gave her $40 to get groceries while he took the truck to make a few deliveries. But when he returned to pick her up two hours later, Nancy was gone. He hadn’t seen her since.
Laura was shocked by Cruz’s story. He seemed to think that Nancy had run off to Mexico, but Laura knew better. She hadn’t heard from her sister in days; even if Nancy had left Cruz, she would have reached out to her family.
On November 22nd, at the family’s insistence, Cruz filed a missing persons report with the El Centro Police Department. But by this point, Nancy had been missing for days, and investigators only had Cruz’s version of events to work with. Detective Luis Hernandez told Dateline that they conducted searches of the shopping center where Cruz claimed to have dropped her off, but there was no sign of Nancy. “We’ve talked to businesses in that area where she was supposedly dropped off. We passed out fliers, and put her on our El Centro Police Department Facebook page. But she hasn’t been seen since.”
The police department in Sunrise, Florida, assisted with the investigation, gathering Nancy’s computer and some of her personal belongings and sending them to detectives in El Centro, but it’s unclear if that led to any useful information.
Weeks passed, and as the new year approached, Nancy’s family grew even more certain that something terrible had happened to her. There had been no phone calls, no messages, not even so much as a postcard. Her bank account sat untouched, even as her disability checks were deposited on schedule. Laura told Dateline that she felt helpless just waiting for answers. “She has a pattern, and this is way off her pattern. Now, she’s missed the holidays. This is not right… She is missing and I can’t do anything about it.”
But Detective Hernandez told Dateline that they didn’t really have much to go on; it was possible that Nancy had just walked off like Cruz suggested. “Right now, there is no indication that there was any foul play.”
A major obstacle in the investigation is that there is no proof that Nancy even made it to California. When she called her father on November 17th, she didn’t say where she was or how far across the country they had driven at that point. Laura told the Sun Sentinel, “That was not part of the conversation. She just wanted to come home.”
Another obstacle, as mentioned before, is that investigators only have Cruz’s word to go on. With so little information, they may not have enough probable cause to get access to Cruz’s phone data or driving records from the trucking company. If they do have that information, they’re not saying, and Nancy’s case is still unsolved.
Nancy’s family has expressed frustration with the investigation, believing that Nancy’s disappearance wasn’t taken seriously because of her past mistakes. Laura told Dateline, “Because she has struggled with addiction, it made this that much harder. It was like she was just another number. But she did not just vanish off the face of this earth.”
As of this recording, Nancy Bromet is still missing. In 2023, eight years after her disappearance, Sergeant Steven Fisher with the El Centro Police Department told Dateline that the evidence they have gathered so far points to Nancy no longer being alive, and to Julio Jesus Cruz being responsible for her likely death. However, no arrest has been made, and Nancy’s remains have not been found.
The Bromet family is still waiting for answers. Laura told the Sun Sentinel, “I fear that I’m not going to see my sister, I want my sister back, but I’m going to keep faith, and I’m going to hope for the best, and I’m going to believe that she’s somewhere alive. We love her, we miss her, and we would like her to come home as soon as possible.”
Nancy Claira Bromet was 37 years old at the time of her disappearance. Her family last spoke to her by phone on November 17, 2015. She was reported as going missing from the Valley Plaza Shopping Center in El Centro, California, on November 20, but it’s possible that she never made it there. She may have been seen in an orange 18-wheel semi truck with Florida license plate number F3171P. Nancy is described as a Hispanic woman with brown hair and hazel eyes standing 5’2” tall. She has multiple tattoos, including a small cross on her right hand, tribal symbols on her neck and left ankle, and a tattoo of the saint Guadalupe on her right leg. She may have been wearing jeans and a black and white shirt when she disappeared.
If you have any information regarding the disappearance of Nancy Bromet please contact Sergeant Fisher of the El Centro Police Department at (760) 337-4502. And please share Nancy’s story so it can get the attention it deserves. Let’s bring Nancy home.